Olympics: Instagram takes gold medal for engagement in Rio 2016

The eyes of the world are once again focused on Brazil, as the country plays host to the biggest global sporting event, the Olympic Games. For digital users, this increased attention has manifested itself in changes to online audiences and behaviour for the Olympics official website and the Sports category, not only in the host nation, but very noticeably across Europe.

Social media is a crucial communication medium for live events, in this case being used to provide and distribute news and information about the games. Facebook was the main social platform used to share official content before the event, but Instagram has overtaken as the social media star for engagement during Rio 2016.

Some of the key findings:

Behind Latin America, Europe was the continent with the second largest audience visiting the Olympics official website before the games started. In June, the UK ranked 3rd in the world in Total Unique Visitors on RIO2016.COM, followed by Australia and Argentina.

With 3 million fans around the world, the Rio 2016 Facebook page increased post cadence before the Olympic games when compared to the previous quarter. Frequency grew from 47 posts per week between April and May to 55 during July 2016.

During July, 40% of total actions on the RIO 2016 Facebook page were generated by posts containing videos. Once the games started, posts with photos took precedence, responsible for 81% of total actions during the first weekend of the games, including likes, shares and comments.

63% of official Rio 2016 social content was posted on Facebook during July. However, despite less content, Instagram was responsible for 72% of the total actions on Rio 2016 social networks during the same month.

MMX can help you understand your target audience size and engagement across the globe. All of these metrics can be compared across digital media strategies and used to understand incremental or complementary activity coming from each of them.